Random Stuff...

Hi there!

I hope you all had a very nice Easter Holiday. Ours was quiet, as usual, but very nice. I tried my hand at making deviled eggs for the first time...let's just say, they didn't taste as good as my friend, Felicia's! She makes THE best deviled eggs. I should have emailed you for your recipe, sweetie. *Ü* (hint, hint, pretty please-take pity on your deviled egg challenged friend) Surprisingly, they tasted better last night than they did on Easter. Go figure. I also made fresh asparagus, which was super duper yummy. I tried the canned stuff last year and let's just say...don't bother with that goop! LOL The weather was rather nice and the girls went out to play with their friends for awhile.

While they were out, I worked on completing a new knitting project. My friend, Nona of Nona's Pearls Purls of Wisdom, has recently started having knit-a-longs. Being that I don't live anywhere near her, I was pleased to see that she offers her patterns for a small fee, for out of towners like me. Well, last week, she asked for test knitters for her April project. The deadline was too tight for me to even think I could do it, but I commented and asked her to keep me in mind for future projects. She was generous enough to let me test her pattern anyway! One of the draws for me on this project is the fact that there are cables. I had never done cables before! She reassured me that I could indeed do it. I discovered I didn't have the size needed in circular needles, but I remembered that the Goodwill had a pretty decent stash of knitting needles that had been donated. So, I went, hoping against hope that they'd have what I needed. And they DID! Whoooheee! And even better, they charged me just 49 cents for them. Double Whoooo heeee!

And here's my version of the Cozy Cabled Hat that she is offering as her April Knit-a-long:

Sorry for the slightly blurry photo. When I tried taking pictures of it, the camera indicated to turn on the flash, but it was totally blowing out the hat when I did that, so I took it without the flash. I'd definitely recommend Nona's patterns if you are a knitter. This was easy to create yet challenging enough to keep you interested in the pattern. Nona's great at answering questions, too! I'm so excited to have learned simple cables! This is the child sized hat, but the girls didn't want to model it for me, darn it.

Here are the girls on Easter Morning, after their little egg hunt in the big room. Most of the photos were of the backs or tops of their heads, LOL Oh well. I was trying to get a cute shot of Amy and Jessica popped into the frame as I took the picture. Love it! Yeah, I should have edited it first, but I didn't.

I received some sweet treats in the mail to help me celebrate the holiday. Thanks, Barb and Jena! You sure do know how to make me smile! There were eggs in those adorable washcloth bunnies, but they got taken out by a couple of girlies who wanted the treats that were inside. The blue one is my Bronco Bunny! The egg in that one was orange. SO cute. And I managed to catch the glittery goodness of Barb's card, yay!!!

Yesterday the girls had the day off from school for a teacher compensation day. The teachers may have gotten a day off, but my girls didn't. (evil giggle) We worked more on getting their room cleaned up. They have shelves in their closet and bins full of junk treasures. We've been going through them and weeding out what they no longer want. They've been doing pretty well, too! But it's a time consuming project. What I was most thrilled with is that we got all the stuff off the floors!

Here's the desk we moved in there a week or so ago. The pillow on the floor is for the dog, who likes to sleep in with them. I even vacuumed that thing off. Kindly disregard the messy bookcase. That's a project for their next day off, which is April 16th. ha ha

Look at those floors! Gloriously CLEAN!!! Sighhhh Are we done? Nope, but it sure looks a heckuvalot better than it did when we started yesterday. And just so you know I'm not the meanest mom on the planet, I took them to McDonald's for lunch if they worked hard for me. That was pretty good incentive, no? LOL

And finally, today, I decided to work on cleaning some of our wood doors. Don't ask me why, there are so many other projects that need doing, but I was sick and tired of seeing how nasty our laundry closet doors looked. So, I got some Murphy's Oil Soap and straight Murphy's Oil and got to work. And I'm gonna show off my hard work. LOL

This is the closet door you see right as you walk in the front door.

I didn't take before shots, and believe me I should have for those slatted doors. Or maybe not, you'd lose respect for me, probably. LOL They are still glossy from the oil, but I'm letting as much soak in as I can before I wipe them down. I'm totally thrilled with how they look. To get in between the slats, I took a spatula and wrapped my cloth around it and used that to get in the little space between the slats. Worked wonderfully, if I do say so myself! And saved my fingers.

With that, I'm going to close for now. Thanks so much for stopping by! I hope you are having a great week!

Happy Easter!

From our Family to Yours...

Jeanne

PS Guess where Steve took the girls yesterday? LOL

Picket Fence Basket & Bunny Nuggets...

Happy Friday! The sun is shining today but apparently we are in for another big storm tomorrow morning. I guess they are even posting a blizzard warning from 6am tomorrow to 6am Sunday. Of course, they've been talking this storm up for a week, so it might not be all that bad. LOL We need the moisture...we need the moisture...we need the moisture...

I wanted to post yesterday because I finished the basket, but I wanted to make the nuggets, so I figured I'd wait and post them together. I copied this basket as seen on the Clearly iStamp blog. The tutorial is a good one and I had fun putting it together.

I followed the tutorial for the basket pretty much to the letter with one exception. Instead of free-hand cutting the pickets, I used my EK Success Zig-Zag border punch and cut the pickets apart. It worked pretty well, although I had to do a little trimming to clean up the edges (I think my trimmer needs a fresh blade). I don't own the stamps used to make the Bunny Nuggets in the inspiration piece so I made do with a DJ Inkers bunny face image from the Dazzle Daze CD and PTI's Polka Dot Basics stamp. The sparkly (but blurry) pom pom tail was found at Jo-Ann's in their dollar bin. I adhered the pieces on the nugget with glue dots. Oh and though you can't see it well, I added Crystal Stickles to the top of the white brad I used to adhere the Prima flowers to the sides of the basket. The punch on the handle is another new style EK Success one called Dotted Waves (I think).

I colored the bunny ears with Koh-i-noor pencils, odorless mineral spirits and used a blending stump to blend the colors. The cheeks are chalked on with pink. The acetate was purchased at Hobby Lobby in the scrapbooking section. It's by Graphix.

I think that is everything, if I've forgotten something, please ask!

I hope you have a great weekend!

Jeanne

Easter Wishes Card...

Happy Sunday to you! I finished the card I mentioned in my post yesterday and would like to share it with you. Brace yourself...I almost can't believe it myself...I bought and used a wood mounted rubber stamp. Yes, I did! I know...I don't usually enjoy stamping when I can't see what I am doing, but in this case, I made an exception(and I even discovered, after I sat down to use the stamp, the stamp on the block is mounted upside down! Gosh, it's enough to make me a nervous wreck!) It's ALL Archiver's fault. They had this card on display in the store and I totally fell in love with the coloring on the image. The artist used markers and lots of sparkle, it's just captivating. Actually, the link I shared does NOT do the card justice at all. I don't know that my card does either, but here's my version...

I purposely made the photo a little bit bigger so you can see the details better. Hopefully, it's not too big for your screen.  I chose to use my Koh-i-noor pencils, odorless mineral spirits and blending stumps to color this image in rather than mess it up by using markers. After I was done coloring, I added some Shimmerz paints...Wheat and Celery. It's hard to see the shimmer in the photo though. I added Icicle Stickles to the flowers. (That's what I was waiting on to dry before I could finish the card yesterday). In my mind I initially thought to use just white and maybe a border punch, but I decided the image was too large and I wanted the focus to be on it rather than it competing with other things. Then I thought using glitter cardstock would enhance the sparkle in the image. I kept it super simple as you can see. Do you think it was worth my breaking down and actually using a woodie? LOL

I will be back in just a bit because I have another project to share, but I think this card deserves to stand alone.

Stamps: Egg with Violets (Northwoods Rubber Stamps), Mixed Messages (PTI)
Cardstock: White, Glittered Cardstock (DCWV)
Ink: Tuxedo Black (Momento)
Accessories: Cuttlebug with Swiss Dots, Koh-i-noor pencils, odorless mineral spirits, blending stumps, Shimmerz paints, Pink Carnation Organdy ribbon (CTMH), White textured ribbon (Walmart), Stickles, Rectangle Nestabilities

Thanks for stopping by. Check back in a bit for the next post.

Jeanne